Three dimensional volumetric display input and output configurations

ABSTRACT

The present invention is a system that allows a number of 3D volumetric display or output configurations, such as dome, cubical and cylindrical volumetric displays, to interact with a number of different input configurations, such as a three-dimensional position sensing system having a volume sensing field, a planar position sensing system having a digitizing tablet, and a non-planar position sensing system having a sensing grid formed on a dome. The user interacts via the input configurations, such as by moving a digitizing stylus on the sensing grid formed on the dome enclosure surface. This interaction affects the content of the volumetric display by mapping positions and corresponding vectors of the stylus to a moving cursor within the 3D display space of the volumetric display that is offset from a tip of the stylus along the vector.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION(S)

This application is a Divisional of and claims priority to U.S.application entitled Three Dimensional Volumetric Display Input andOutput Configurations, having Ser. No. 10/830,073, by Kurtenbach et al.,filed Apr. 23, 2004, which is a continuation of and claims priority toU.S. application entitled Three Dimensional Volumetric Display Input andOutput Configurations, having Ser. No. 10/183,970, by Kurtenbach et al.,filed Jun. 28, 2002 and issued as U.S. Pat. No. 6,753,847 on Jun. 22,2004, which claims priority to U.S. provisional application entitledUser Interfaces For Volumetric Displays, having Ser. No. 60/350,952 (S&HDocket 1252.1054P), by Kurtenbach et al, filed Jan. 25, 2002. Thisapplication is also related to U.S. application entitled VolumeManagement System For Volumetric Displays, having Ser. No. 10/183,966(S&H Docket 1252.1065), by Kurtenbach et al, filed Jun. 28, 2002, toU.S. application entitled Widgets Displayed And Operable On A Surface OfA Volumetric Display Enclosure, having Ser. No. 10/183,945 (S&H Docket1252.1066) by Fitzmaurice et al, filed Jun. 28, 2002, to U.S.application entitled Graphical User Interface Widgets Viewable AndReadable From Multiple Viewpoints In A Volumetric Display, having Ser.No. 10/183,968 (S&H Docket 1252.1067), by Fitzmaurice et al, filed Jun.28, 2002, to U.S. application entitled A System For Physical Rotation ofVolumetric Display Enclosures To Facilitate Viewing, having Ser. No.10/183,765 (S&H Docket 1252.1068), by Balakrishnan et al, filed Jun. 28,2002, and to U.S. application entitled Techniques For Pointing ToLocations Within A Volumetric Display, having Ser. No. 10/183,944 (S&HDocket 1252.1069), by Balakrishnan et al, filed Jun. 28, 2002, and allof which are incorporated by reference herein.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention is directed to input and output configurations forthree-dimensional volumetric displays and, more particularly, to inputconfigurations that allow the content of a three-dimensional volumetricdisplay output configuration to be affected by actions by a useroperating within an input configuration.

2. Description of the Related Art

A class of three-dimensional (3D) displays, called volumetric displays,is currently undergoing rapid advancement. The types of displays in thisclass include holographic displays, swept volume displays and staticvolume displays. Volumetric displays allow for three-dimensional (3D)graphical scenes to be displayed within a true 3D volume. Such displayscan take many shapes including cylinders, globes, domes, cubes, anarbitrary shape, etc. with a dome being a typical shape. Because thetechnology of these displays is undergoing rapid development those ofskill in the art are concentrating on the engineering of the displayitself. As a result, the man-machine interface to or input/outputconfigurations with which people interface with these types of displaysis receiving scant attention.

While the volumetric displays allow a user to view different parts of atrue 3D scene, the act of viewing the different parts typically requiresthat the user physically move around (or over) the display or that thedisplay be moved or rotated in front of the user. As the display movesrelative to the user, graphical objects may also move relative to theuser. When the display is relatively stationary or when it is relativelymoving, the user may need to interact with the display. As a result,what the user needs is an effective mechanism for interacting with thedisplay.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is an aspect of the present invention to provide effective mechanismsfor a user to interact with content of the three-dimensional volumetricdisplay.

It is also an aspect of the present invention to provide input andoutput configurations for a three-dimensional volumetric display.

It is another aspect of the present invention to provide dome, cubicaland cylindrical output configurations.

It is also an aspect of the present invention to provide inputconfigurations that allow a 3D volumetric input space to be mapped tothe 3D volumetric display, a planer 2D input space to be mapped to the3D volumetric display, a planar 2D input space to be mapped to a planar2D space within the 3D volumetric display, and a non-planar 2D inputspace to be mapped to the 3D volumetric display.

The above aspects can be attained by a system that allows a number of 3Dvolumetric display configurations, such as dome, cubical and cylindricalvolumetric display enclosures, to interact with a number of differentinput configurations, for example, a three-dimensional position sensingsystem, a planar position sensing system and a non-planar positionsensing system. The user interacts with the input configurations, suchas by moving a stylus on a sensing grid formed on an enclosure surface.This interaction affects the content of the volumetric display, forexample, by moving a cursor within the 3D display space of thevolumetric display.

These together with other aspects and advantages which will besubsequently apparent, reside in the details of construction andoperation as more fully hereinafter described and claimed, referencebeing had to the accompanying drawings forming a part hereof, whereinlike numerals refer to like parts throughout.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 shows a volumetric display.

FIGS. 2, 3 and 4 depict a 3D to 3D system configurations.

FIGS. 5, 6 and 7 depict 2D to 3D configurations.

FIG. 8 shows a non-planar to 3D configuration.

FIGS. 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14 show configurations with physicalintermediaries.

FIG. 15 depicts components of the system

FIGS. 16A, 16B, 16C and 16D illustrate digitizer embodiments.

FIG. 17 illustrates components of a digitizer.

FIGS. 18A, 18B and 18C show details of a dome shaped digitizer.

FIG. 19 depicts the operations of the system.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

Volumetric displays allow a user to have a true three-dimensional (3D)view of a scene 12 and are typically provided in the form of a dome 14,as depicted in FIG. 1. The user 16, as can be surmised from FIG. 1, canmove about the dome 14 to view different parts of the scene 12. From aparticular arbitrary viewpoint or position, a user may want to interactwith the scene or content within the volumetric display.

There are a number of different solutions to this problem. Thesesolutions involve creating input/output configurations for thevolumetric display that define a spatial correspondence between an inputspace and an output space. The configurations also define a dynamicallyupdatable spatial correspondence of the input and output spaces with theuser.

In a first solution, a 3D volumetric input space is mapped to a 3Dvolumetric display space. In one configuration, as depicted in FIG. 2,the user's hand 30 is tracked via a glove or a set of cameras in avolume 32 directly below the display volume 34. A virtual representationof the hand 36, or some other type of position indicator, such as acursor, is superimposed into the 3D output volumetric display 34. In asecond configuration, as depicted in FIG. 3, the 3D display 50 issurrounded by a 3D input space 52, created by a 3D volume input system,such as the Flock of Birds system from Ascension Technology Corporation.In this configuration, the user's hand 54, including a positionindicator/sensor, is mapped to a cursor 56 or some other positionindicator representation, such as a virtual hand, within the display 50.The position sensor also produces a vector that indicates whichdirection the sensor is pointing. The vector can be used to create acursor in the enclosure at a fixed position along the vector. Ratherthan using the vector produced by the position sensor, the system infersan input vector based on the position of the input device and the centerof the display. This spatial relationship or correspondence between theinput space, output space and user position is dynamically updated asthe user moves about the display. That is, the input/output space isautomatically compensated/reconfigured. Another configuration is to usehalf-silvered mirrors 70 (see FIG. 4) to combine the volumetric image 72with the user's view of their hands in a hand movement volume. This way,the user sees their hands operating within the display. Anotheralternative is to use a camera to capture the users hands in the inputspace and superimpose them onto the volumetric display space. Anotheralternative is an augmented-reality system where the user has asee-through, head mounted display (2D) which is being tracked. As theuser moves the position and orientation of their head, graphics arepresented on the LCD display and are aligned with real-world objects.

Another solution is to map a planer 2D input space into a 3D outputspace. This is particularly useful in controlling some subset of the 3Dvolumetric display space. For example, a standard 2D digitizing tabletor digitizer 90 (see FIG. 5) or a regular mouse can be mapped to controlaspects of the 3D scene, such as moving 3D objects along two dimensions.

A further solution is to map a planar 2D input space to a planar 2Dspace within the 3D output space of the display, as depicted in FIG. 6.In this situation, the system maps the input space of a digitizingtablet 110 and the tilt/orientation of the tablet as sensed by atilt/orientation sensor 112 to a corresponding planar space 114 in thedisplay 116. The angle of the plane 114 is responsive to the sensor 112.If the display enclosure 130 has planar surfaces (e.g., a cubicenclosure), the enclosure surface is used as the planar input device, asdepicted in FIG. 7. It is also possible to use a transparent digitizersuperimposed over an LCD display.

Still another solution is to map a non-planar 2D input space to a 3Doutput space. In this solution, as depicted in FIG. 8, the system usesthe display enclosure 140 as the input space (i.e., the enclosure is atransparent digitizing input surface). In this embodiment, the position142 touched by the user or indicated by a pointing device, such as astylus or surface fitting curved mouse, is mapped to a position in thedisplay. This is a direct and compelling way to interact with thesedisplays.

In addition to direct manipulation using the hands, the solutionsdescribed herein also provide physical intermediaries between the handsand the input space as described below.

Another solution when the user desires to interact directly with theenclosure surface, is to deform the surface 160 of a conventionaldeformable membrane surface that detects multiple pressure points andfinger pinches 162, as depicted in FIG. 9. In this situation, thesurface to display mapping discussed above is performed.

Instead of using the hands directly on the enclosure surface, the systemhas a surface that detects and tracks a variety of input devices. Adigital stylus 180, as shown in FIG. 10, where a point and anorientation can be input or a Rockin'Mouse shaped device 190, as shownin FIG. 11 (see U.S. Pat. No. 6,115,028) also allowing a point and anorientation to be input are used. A surface fitting wireless mouse, suchas a curved (concave) bottom mouse, can be used with a curved surfaceoutput configuration. This type of mouse can also be park-able usingelectrostatic, magnetic or some other sticky method of removablyadhering the mouse to the display surface. Using a mouse has theadvantage of buttons and form factors with which people are familiar. Inthis situation, the surface to display mapping discussed above isperformed.

The physical intermediaries also do not have to be on the enclosureitself as described below.

In an embodiment input devices 200, such as buttons, keyboards, sliders,touch-pads, mice and space-ball type devices, etc., are mounted alongthe perimeter of the display (see FIG. 12). In this embodiment, theinput devices such as buttons for up, down, forward, backward, left andright motions, allowing multiple degrees of freedom, are used to controlthe position of a cursor like such buttons control the position of acursor in a 2D system. The input devices 210, 212, 214 may need to be“repeated” (i.e., have more than one of each along the perimeter) toallow for simultaneous used by many users, or for use from any positionthe user may be standing/sitting at as shown in FIG. 13. Rather thathaving multiple input devices positioned around the display as depictedin FIG. 13, the mounting platform 220 that houses these devices could bemade moveable (rotatable) around the display, as depicted in FIG. 14, sothat users can easily bring the required device within reach by simplymoving the platform. These devices typically communicate wirelessly byradio or infrared signals. The position of the movable device alsoprovides information about the users position or viewpoint.

The present invention is typically embodied in a system as depicted inFIG. 15 where physical interface elements 230, such as a rotary domeposition encoder, infrared user position detectors, a keyboard, touchsensitive dome enclosure surface, mouse, beam pointer, beam pointer withthumbwheel, stylus and digitizer pad or stylus and stylus sensitive domeenclosure surface, stylus with pressure sensor, flock-of-birds, etc. arecoupled to a computer 232, such as a server class machine. The computer232 uses a graphical creation process, such as the animation packageMAYA available from Alias|Wavefront, Inc., to create three-dimensional(3D) scene elements. This process, using position inputs from the inputconfigurations as discussed herein, also creates the virtual interfaceelements, such as a virtual hand, a 3D point cursor, a 3D volume cursor,a pointing beam, a bead, etc. The display output, including the sceneand interface elements, is provided to a volumetric display apparatusconfiguration 234, such as one that will produce a 3D holographicdisplay and discussed herein.

The configurations that include a transparent digitizer or touchsensitive surface have a number of different shapes as depicted in FIGS.16A-16D. In one embodiment a dome shaped enclosure 250 has a dome shapeddigitizing tablet as depicted in FIG. 16A. In another embodiment thedome shaped enclosure 256 (see FIG. 16B) is used with a rectangular orcylindrical shaped digitizing tablet 258. In a further embodiment, asshown in FIG. 16C, a cylindrical or cubical enclosure 260 is used withcylindrical or cubical digitizer surface. In a different embodiment theenclosure 264 is dome shaped (or cubical or cylindrical) and thedigitizing surface 266 is planar as depicted in FIG. 16D.

A digitizer 280 (see FIG. 17), such as described in U.S. Pat. No.5,854,449 incorporated by reference herein, determines a position of astylus or pointer 282 relative to a surface 284, such as a transparentdome surface, having a checker board type closely spaced positional grid286 thereon when seen from above. A processor 288 determines the coarseposition of the pointer relative to the grid by sampling the grid linesthrough a set of multiplexers 290 and 292. An error correction system294 generates and outputs a true position of the pointer 282 relative tothe surface 284 to a computer system 232 (see FIG. 15). The pointer 282typically includes an electromagnetic transducer for inducing a signalin the positional grid 286 and the processor 288 is coupled to thepositional grid 286 for sensing the signal and generating the coarseposition of the pointer 282. The transducers also allow thedetermination of a vector from grid signals that indicates in whichdirection the pointer 282 is pointing. Touch sensitive input surfacesoperate in a similar fashion.

The positional grid 286 can be applied to a surface of an enclosure,such as a dome shaped enclosure 310, as depicted in FIGS. 18A and 18B.FIGS. 18A and 18B (an exploded view) show a section 312 of the domesurface including an inner substrate 314 and outer substrate 316 betweenwhich is sandwiched the grid 318. The substrates comprise transparentmaterials, such as glass or plastic.

In using these input and output configurations the computer system 232(see FIG. 15) performs a number of operations as depicted in FIG. 19.The operations include obtaining 330 the coordinate systems of the inputdevice and the volumetric display. The range of the coordinate systemsis also obtained so that out-of-space conditions can be determined.Next, the system samples 332 positional outputs of the input device,such as the digitizer, mouse, flock-of-birds, etc., to obtain thelocation of the users input. This information can also includeinformation about where the user is pointing. This position (andorientation if desired) is mapped 334 into a 3D position within thevolumetric display using the coordinate system (and the orientationvector, if needed). The cursor or other position indicatingrepresentation, such as a virtual hand, is drawn 336 at the mappedposition with the volumetric display. The mapping may involvedetermining a position on the surface that is being touched by adigitizing stylus, projecting a ray into the enclosure from the touchposition where the ray is oriented by the pointing vector of the inputstylus and positioning the cursor at a variable or fixed position alongthe ray. Another mapping causes relative motion of a 3D input devicesuch as a glove to be imparted to a cursor when a motion function isactivated. Other mappings as discussed in the related applications arepossible.

The operations described with respect to FIG. 19, when a digitizingenclosure surface is the input configuration, allow the user to interactwith a surface of a three-dimensional (3D) volumetric display and affectthe 3D content of the display responsive to the interaction. Theinteraction involves the user manipulating the stylus in a sensingregion of the digitizing grid, the mapping of the stylus position to a3D display position and the creation of a cursor at a 3D displayposition. The cursor, in one of a number of different possibilities, iscreated at a distance offset from a tip of the stylus along a pointingvector of the stylus. The cursor can be used to perform typicalfunctions such as selecting, painting, dragging/dropping, etc.

The present invention has been described with respect to inputconfigurations where commands are input through position sensing typedevices, such as a mouse, a pointer, touch sensitive surface, etc. It isalso possible to use other types of input configurations, such asnon-spatial configurations. One non-spatial input space or configurationis a conventional voice or speech recognition system. In thisconfiguration a voice command, such as “down” is recognized and theselected object or volume is moved accordingly. In this case down. Theobject is moved down in the display space at a constant slow rate untilit reaches the bottom or until another command, such as “stop” is inputand recognized. For user centric commands, such as “move closer”, a userposition sensing system inputs the user position, the position is usedto determine the relative position of the active object with respect tothe user or the vector pointing from user to the object. This vector isused to determine a direction for object movement. To move closer theobject is moved along the vector toward the user by moving in a negativedirection. Again the motion would continue until a blocking object isencountered or another command is recognized.

Another non-spatial input configuration uses non-speech sounds, such astones from a conventional multifrequency tone generator. Eachmultifrequency combination corresponds to a command and a conventionaltone recognition system is used to convert the sounds to commands.

The input space or configuration could also use conventionaleye-tracking-head-tracking technologies alone or in combination withother input configurations.

The many features and advantages of the invention are apparent from thedetailed specification and, thus, it is intended by the appended claimsto cover all such features and advantages of the invention that fallwithin the true spirit and scope of the invention. Further, sincenumerous modifications and changes will readily occur to those skilledin the art, it is not desired to limit the invention to the exactconstruction and operation illustrated and described, and accordinglyall suitable modifications and equivalents may be resorted to, fallingwithin the scope of the invention.

1. A system, comprising: a dome shaped three-dimensional (3D) volumetricdisplay having an enclosure surface; an input configuration comprising adigitizing system passively digitizing actions by the user; and acomputer coupled between the display and the digitizing system,producing 3D content displayed in the display, mapping the non-planarposition coordinates to a 3D coordinate position in the display byoffsetting along the vector by an offset distance from the tip andaffecting the content at the 3D coordinate position.
 2. A system,comprising: a three-dimensional (3D) volumetric display outputconfiguration having a display content; and an input configurationcoupled to the volumetric display output configuration and allowing auser to affect the display content, said input configuration comprisinga light ray projection system projection a ray into on said display. 3.A system, comprising: a three-dimensional (3D) volumetric display outputconfiguration having a display content; and an input configurationcoupled to the volumetric display output configuration and allowing auser to affect the display content, said input configuration comprisinga camera sensing a state of an input object.